thekua.com@rest

After my conference, I took the weekend off to stay in downtown Scottsdale before heading back home. Scottsdale is one of the other cities that is sort of part of Phoenix and is the cultural centre of Phoenix with plenty of arts galleries and performances around. I didn’t have many options but to stay in Scottsdale because I didn’t have a car and Phoenix is really one of those places where you need one, even to get to tourist attractions because of a dire lack of a public transport system.

Walking around Scottsdale is easy enough with a tourist centre providing big maps plotting out all the interesting sights. It’s easy enough to walk around the entire city within a day but it did give me an opportunity to unwind and enjoy the warmth of the desert. There’s plenty of cultural entertainment and I was lucky enough to catch a Native Trails performance produced by the Fort McDowell Yavapai Nation, sharing many of the indigenous American traditions including music and dance.

I don’t think the city is sustainable at the rate of growth and development they’re pushing for though. In the midst of the desert, they are trying to bring back the canal into huge use and continue the development of “water-front” apartments. I’m lead to believe there is already a water issue coming and yet many people insist on having grass on their front lawns, and the water-hungry plants that they might be used to in other parts of the country, not realising the demands it requires from their current environment.

Comments(2)

28 Days Later was a pretty impressive film for me mainly for the way it managed to empty (or simulate) many parts of London (such as the ever busy area of Big Ben and Westminster Abbey).

I stumbled across this painted sign (above) all over pathways around East London and is promoting the upcoming sequel release, 28 Weeks Later. I don’t know if they had local council or city approval, but I like way this biohazard symbol is enigmatically painted all over the pavements. This one I caught outside Old Street station on the way to Hoxton Square.

Comments(0)

Las Vegas is a very strange city with so many aspects adult oriented yet heavily advertised as a grand place for families. It seems like almost everything is available in Las Vegas, and is extremely surreal given that its sits in the middle of the desert. Most of the visible action can be found on the main strip, fondly called The Strip with many of the hotels constantly reinventing themselves and building bigger, and better attractions and amusements to lure people to spend more time and money inside. (more…)

Comments(0)

Although a trip to the West Coast of the States isn’t as bad as it can be flying home to Australia from the UK, it’s amazing how little things can make the trip a lot more painful. How’s this sound for a not-very-ideal trip:

• An hour by train
• Two hours at the Gatwick airport
• A ten and a half hour flight into Dallas
• Two hours standing in queue to get through immigration
• You miss your connecting flight to Vegas by ten minutes
• Another two hour wait in the airport for the next flight
• Another three hour flight to Las Vegas
• A half hour waiting for luggage only to discover it never made it on your flight

My only consolation was that my hotel had only one room left by the time I got there and it just so happened it was a Jacuzzi suite (click more to see the picture) (more…)

Comments(3)